Martin Plenio – Towards quantum technologies Quantum mechanics is about to fundamentally change the way we can transmit and sense information. The idea is that information—represented by physical quantities such as the spin or the polarisation of an individual photon—can be transmitted with the help of so-called quantum entanglement.

Andris Ambainis - The road to quantum computing Quantum computers will be much more powerful than those we have today. But they do not exist yet. So, what do quantum computer scientists study? They plan algorithms to be used if and when quantum computers will be built.

Forecasting desert storms to empower solar panels To prevent energy loss and improve the management of solar power plants scientists of the European research project MACC II in France are now developing a 5-day forecast to predict the movements of desert dust and thus will be able to inform power plant managers beforehand.

Chen Sagiv: crowdsourcing for creating 3D videos As smart phones are becoming ubiquitous, they increasingly serve as a link to social networks. Networks sharing of large concerts or sporting events with 3D imagery will soon be made possible thanks to a new technology developed under SceneNet , an EU funded project, due to be completed in 2016.

Giorgio Metta: The advent of the sensing robot In science fiction, robots acts like human beings. A close look at the state of the art robotics would tell us that the technology is not likely to emulate science fiction yet. But there has been much progress in the field.

Jani Kivioja – Graphene: not just a Geek Gamble Graphene FET Flagship is an ambitious European project focused on the eponymous new wonder material. Graphene, a one-atom thick layer of carbon, is light, transparent and strong, whose characteristics have yet to be fully discovered.

Andre Geim: graphene is only the beginning Andre Konstantin Geim is the only person who ever received both a Nobel and an Ig Nobel . He was born in 1958 in Russia, and is a Dutch-British physicist with German, Polish, Jewish and Ukrainian roots.

The Ecological Badminton Robot Wim Symens and his team pioneered the development of the first robot ever to play badminton. But this robot is only a guinea pig to test a software application designed to optimise energy efficiency in machine design.

Transparent Electronics In the MULTIFLEXIOXIDES project scientist have developed new cost-efficient, long lasting, light, flexible and transparent devices which can display information directly on the windscreen.

Moving away from silicon technology Silicon, the conventional semiconductor used to build up electronics, is processed at very high temperature – over one thousand Celsius degrees - and it is difficult to recycle.

Nano Foil Brightens Screen Engineers of the European research project NaPanil have modified the glass surfaces on the micrometric and nanometric scale in order to control the path of the light.A unique innovation that could soon become part of our daily lives.

A nanotech solution controlling the path of light Researchers have modified surface structures by making nanometer scale patterns, with the help from a technology called nanoimprinting. Nanoimprinting is a high through-put and low cost method that produces these patterns through the use of a stamp.

The 3D Nanoscanner Researchers from the Institute of Micro- and Nanotechnologies in Ilmenau, Germany have developed the new scanning device with a set of highly sensitive needles or cantilevers , each of which is only a few microns wide.